Natasha ends up boring him about David Lynch for the next twenty minutes, and she figures the little shit deserves it.
While Aidan's there, they don’t fuck as much. There’s one evening when Sawyer ambushes Natasha straight from the shower. She pushes Natasha down on to the bed, digging her fingers into Natasha’s muscular stomach. She’s got a ball gag in one hand and a strap on in the other. Natasha lets Sawyer push the silicone, puckered with marks from Sawyer’s oddly spaced teeth, between her jaws. Sawyer rummages in Natasha’s hair to fasten the buckle at the back of her head. Sawyer kisses her on the tip of her nose, and then bends Natasha’s knees up so she can slip the harness up Natasha’s legs and on to her hips.
Sawyer pulls the straps tight and then whispers in Natasha’s ear, “Don’t you judge me. Don’t you fucking judge me.”
Sawyer settles herself down over Natasha’s hips and takes the length of the toy inside her in one go. Her eyes roll back and her mouth drops open, but otherwise she rides Natasha for twenty minutes in complete silence. Sawyer controls her rhythm so tightly that their bed doesn’t even squeak. Natasha's pretty sure Sawyer's mostly using her internal muscles to get herself off, and for the first time in her life Natasha wishes she had a real cock so she could feel her muscles flutter and clench around her. Natasha can’t resist grabbing Sawyer’s tightly clenched thighs. When Sawyer’s eventually done she flops down onto Natasha’s chest, hissing “Thank you. I so needed that.”
On a sunny Friday afternoon, an argument erupts out of nowhere. It's good natured at first; he tries to get Sawyer to admit to having a fake ID when she was his age, and then tries to get Natasha to talk to one of his buddies on the phone.
Suddenly, Aidan throws a large glass against the door of the refrigerator. He looks at the broken glass spread across the kitchen tiles with wide eyes. He holds his hand frozen in the air, as if he cannot connect it to his body. Natasha stares at the glass shards all over the floor. Her mind starts racing. Someone’s going to slip. Someone’s going to cut themselves.
Sawyer slowly gets to her feet. She walks to Aidan. She lowers her voice, “Don’t you ever dare throw shit in my house again.”
Aidan looks down his nose at her. He shifts his weight from one foot, to the other. He bends his elbows so that they stick out. Sawyer keeps her face neutral, pleasant. Like she’s waiting for her train ticket to be approved by the conductor.
He walks close to Sawyer, ripples his shoulders like a panther. He lowers his voice to match hers and snarls, “Who the fuck even are you, anyway?”
He stomps upstairs and returns twenty minutes later, in a new t-shirt and his best shoes. He’s talking loudly on his phone, “Yeah I’m on my way. Just got to lose these dykes first." Aidan pauses and turns to look at Sawyer, "The fat one is being a right bitch.”
Then he’s gone, the door slamming behind him. Sawyer is quiet all evening, and they head to bed sooner than they ever would normally. Natasha wraps all her body around the back of Sawyer’s. She tries to wriggle her fingers everywhere they fit, crunches her knees firmly in the back of Sawyer’s. Sawyer doesn’t fall asleep straight away like she usually does, even when Natasha puts her favorite podcast on.
“I’m sorry Aidan was so vile to you earlier.”
Sawyer doesn't respond, but Natasha can feel her muscles stiffen.
Natasha continues, “I’m sure he’s just playing on the Playstation with the boys.”
Sawyer remains silent. Natasha tries again.
“I’m sorry I wasn’t very proactive, I didn’t know what to –“
Sawyer interrupts, “It’s not that. It’s none of that. I’m angry with myself. I’m angry that I let a teenage boy intimidate me.”
Natasha squeezes Sawyer around the middle as hard as she can. She rattles off what she can think of to say, "You're safe. He's just a boy really. I'm here. He probably already feels like an idiot. I love you. You're strong. You're doing a good job."
Sawyer doesn't speak again, but her breathing gets slower and heavier.
In the morning, Natasha is dimly aware of Sawyer thumping around. She hears the jingle of Sawyer’s car keys as she stands over Natasha next to the bed.
“Natasha, I need to go to work now. Aidan is home. Will you try and make him some breakfast and talk to him?”
Natasha wants to remove him from the house. She wants to call the social worker and say that they’ve tried, but he was abusive to Sawyer and he has to go. But there’s no way that Sawyer would forgive her if she did that.
Instead, she picks her way through the dirty t-shirts on the floor of his room and shakes him awake.
“Aidan, do you want eggs?”
He nods before he cracks his eyes open. Natasha sees the remorse in the sliver of grey that meets her own.
Aidan sits with his elbows braced either side of his plate of eggs. He interlocks his hands like he’s praying, and rests his forehead on top.
“Natasha, do you want me just to go?” He shrugs in a way that he must think looks worldly wise, “I mean, I’ve got places I can be.”
“No, you don’t.
